TA Gaming Stats - 2014

By Chewie,
This report is for the period January 1st to December 31st 2014.

Welcome one and all to the stats from here on TrueAchievements for the whole of 2014. This year was the first full year of the new console generation so the numbers for the One pick up considerably while the numbers for the 360 begin to slide, though "Games with Gold" is definitely keeping it afloat. This year also saw the release of the awesome TrueAchievements, which has led to a heap of new sign-ups to the site. This has meant that this year's numbers are naturally inflated across the board, simply because we have more members to scan. And we welcome you all with open arms! My Ewok helpers, the Statisticles, and I compiled these stats with our own blood, sweat and tears. Well, mostly theirs, I was busy drinking cocktails. So, I hope you enjoy them and feel free to leave some comments about what your 2014 looked like in terms of gaming and how it compares to these tables!

Games Started
240,255 TrueAchievements gamers started a total of 5,408,379 games between them (2,864 different games).

The most started game on the One this year (and on all platforms for that matter) was Titanfall with pushing 87,000 starters. Following in second and third are more recent releases Destiny and Halo: The Master Chief Collection with 77,000 and over 64,000 starters each. Halo in particular should be commended considering it pulls in that position after only being out in the last two months of the year, compared with Titanfall's March release.

Other big releases of the year follow down the table with the likes of Watch_Dogs, Call of Duty: Advanced Warfare and Sunset Overdrive all grabbing around 50,000 starters.

Some of these titles do a lot better than they probably normally would by virtue of the "Games with Gold" program that had new and recent releases dropped to the bargain price of zero. Starting off halfway through 2014 on the One, the program helps put Max: The Curse of Brotherhood way up in fifth, Crimson Dragon in seventh, Guacamelee! Super Turbo Championship Edition in ninth, Halo: Spartan Assault (iOS) in tenth, Worms Battlegrounds in eleventh and Chariot in eighteenth. Not all the "Games with Gold" titles appear though, as Super Time Force, Strike Suit Zero: Director's Cut and Völgarr the Viking don't quite make the cut.

Dotted amongst these in the bottom half of the table are some other big names, particularly recent ones, like Grand Theft Auto V, Assassin's Creed Unity and Forza Horizon 2. We also get a few of last year's bigger titles thrown in, such as Forza Motorsport 5, Plants vs. Zombies Garden Warfare and Battlefield 4. The first gets a boost thanks to a free trial weekend, whilst the other two are helped by the EA Access program.

A few notable releases from 2014 that didn't quite make the table include Dragon Age: Inquisition, Far Cry 4 and Naughty Kitties. OK, maybe that last one's not so notable...

Top Xbox One Games Started

Leading the way on the 360 for games started in 2014 is a game from 2011, followed closely by one from 2012. Yes, with the decline in big new releases on the 360 and migration of players to the One, the continued proliferation of "Games with Gold" freebies has a much heftier impact on the previous gen than it does on the new one. In fact the only game in the top eight that was actually released in 2014 is South Park: The Stick of Truth (Xbox 360). The rest are "Games with Gold" titles, with Dark Souls and Sleeping Dogs proving the most popular. Further down the table, other freebies show up with Darksiders II, SSX and Super Street Fighter IV making appearances. Halo: Reach, Battlefield: Bad Company 2, Viva Piñata: Trouble In Paradise and Red Faction: Guerrilla however didn't lure enough new starters in with their freeness to make the table.

Looking at stuff that was actually released in 2014, apart from South Park, Destiny (Xbox 360), https://www.trueachievements.com/Dark-Souls-II-Xbox-360....htm, Fable Anniversary Borderlands: The Pre-Sequel (Xbox 360) and Titanfall (Xbox 360) pulled in between 15,000 and 21,000 starters. It's interesting that Titanfall beat out Destiny on the One, but on the 360 the reverse is true. Rockstar's classic port of Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas also lands in nineteenth, bolstered not only by nostalgia but also a very cheap special release price and a number of subsequent sales.

Big name titles from last year also make the table, with Grand Theft Auto V (Xbox 360), Assassin's Creed IV: Black Flag (Xbox 360) and Call of Duty: Ghosts (Xbox 360) all doing decently. Interestingly, despite last year's versions appearing, neither this year's Assassin's Creed Rogue nor Call of Duty: Advanced Warfare (Xbox 360) make an appearance.

Top Xbox 360 Retail Games Started

"Games with Gold" has a similar domination effect on the Arcade, with Deadlight leading a top ten dedicated to freebies. Two of those weren't part of that program though. Instead they were the free-to-play titles Warface and World of Tanks: Xbox 360 Edition in second and third. It's worth noting that, despite being the second most started title on the Arcade, Warface is due to have its servers closed early this year so the free-to-play model isn't necessarily a successful one, despite what the numbers suggest. Other "Games with Gold" titles further down the list include Shoot Many Robots and Monaco: What's Yours is Mine. On the free-to-play side we also get AirMech Arena and Ascend: Hand of Kul, the latter of which also saw a server closure towards the end of the year. Hexic HD also appears in nineteenth thanks to new 360 purchasers who got it on the their consoles for free.

Telltale titles also make appearances in eleventh, twelfth and sixteenth with The Walking Dead: Season Two (Xbox 360) taking the highest place over The Wolf Among Us (Xbox 360) and The Walking Dead (Xbox 360). The fact that those three titles saw their first episodes made free this year means that there are only two titles on the entire table that are not or have not been free on 2014: Minecraft: Xbox 360 Edition in fourteenth and Far Cry 3 Blood Dragon right at the bottom.

With all this freeness, the other Telltale titles that started this year, Tales from the Borderlands (Xbox 360) and Game of Thrones: A Telltale Games Series (Xbox 360), don't get a look-in and neither do the likes of Peggle 2 (Xbox 360), Child of Light (Xbox 360) or Slender: The Arrival.

Top Xbox 360 Arcade Games Started

2014 sees a lot more new titles for Windows Phone than 2013 with half the games in the table released that year and many released at the tail end of the previous December. As with last year though, free-to-play or outright free dominates the table. Thanks to all the Angry Birds titles being made free throughout the year, only three games on the whole list carry any kind of price tag: Rabbids Big Bang (WP), Rayman Fiesta Run (WP) and Shark Dash (WP). It's Wordament Snap Attack (WP) that leads the table though, with its predecessor also popping up at the bottom, making it a Wordament sandwich. A few of the Microsoft titles also appear, with Microsoft Mahjong (WP), Microsoft Minesweeper (WP) and Microsoft Solitaire Collection (WP) securing spots in the top half of the table.

Top Windows Phone Games Started

Free Microsoft titles have a much bigger impact on W8, claiming seven spots in the top half of the table, including the top five. Like WP, it's a mostly free-to-play dominated table. In fact only one title comes at any cost, Halo: Spartan Assault (Win 8), right at the bottom. Of note is Glacier Blast (Win 8) which, like Warface, released in 2014 but wasn't long for the world. The servers have now closed. Unfortunately, Secrets and Treasure: The Lost Cities (Win 8), which appears on both WP and W8 tables is also destined for the same fate.

Top Windows 8 Games Started

Games Completed
101,834 TrueAchievements gamers completed a total of 673,992 games between them (2,724 different games).

The combination of being free and easy helps put Max well in advance at the top of the completed table for the One, far above any of the big retail titles with over 5,700 completions. The easiest popular retail title was Wolfenstein: The New Order, which claims second with 3,500 completions, despite not appearing on the Started table. In fact only three of the most completed titles appeared on the Started table at all: Max, Minecraft: Xbox One Edition and Guacamelee.

Most of the table is taken up by smaller-scale digital releases, including ID@Xbox indie titles, with easy completions, such as Child of Light, Nutjitsu, Valiant Hearts: The Great War and Another World: 20th Anniversary Edition. Other titles from 2014 include the Telltale titles The Walking Dead and The Walking Dead: Season Two (but not The Wolf Among Us),Murdered: Soul Suspect and Far Cry 4. Easier titles from 2013 also appear, with the typical easy LEGO completions, Ryse: Son of Rome and FIFA 14.

Top Xbox One Games Completed

Although "Games with Gold" dominated the Started table, it's a little less prevalent here as South Park and Fable Anniversary, both fairly easy completions from 2014, lead the table. That's not to say "Games with Gold" titles don't appear in significant numbers though. Hitman, Civilization, Dark Souls, Sleeping Dogs and Saints Row III all take their places on the table.

Older titles that saw big DLC sales in the year also take high places with the likes of Borderlands 2 (Xbox 360) and The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim. Elsewhere we also get some easy games from previous years, like Assassin's Creed II (an early "Games with Gold" title), Far Cry 3, a couple of early CoDs, a smattering of LEGO and that notorious score-whore title, Avatar: The Last Airbender: The Burning Earth.

Top Xbox 360 Retail Games Completed

Telltale almost rules the table with three titles in the top four. Deadlight interrupts the trifecta in second with 9,000 completions thanks to easiness and "Games with Gold" popularity. Other "Games with Gold" titles include Dust, Shoot Many Robots, Charlie Murder, Lara Croft and World of Keflings. Like last year, Minecraft and Far Cry 3 Blood Dragon do pretty well in fifth and seventh. Sales also help put other easy titles like Brothers - A Tale of Two Sons, Assassin's Creed Liberation HD, Dead Rising 2: Case Zero and Contrast (Xbox 360) on the list. We've already spoken about server closures for some unfortunate titles but now's the time to mention Doritos Crash Course 2, which saw its servers close in October and which appears here in fourteenth with over 1,700 completions as people rushed to finish it before closure day.

Top Xbox 360 Arcade Games Completed

Temple Run 2 smashes the completions on WP getting over twice as many as its nearest rival at over 2,100. Considering how many new titles appear on the Started table, the Completed table is notably absent of 2014 releases. That's mostly because many of them are free-to-play grinds and not particularly that easy or quick to finish. We do get Rayman Fiesta Run in third and Tiny Troopers in eighteenth and, well, that's it. The rest of the games on the table represent the easiest completions on the platform from previous years, many of which have received boosts thanks to repeated sales.

Top Windows Phone Games Completed

As could probably be expected, the two easiest Microsoft freebies, Microsoft Solitaire Collection (Win 8) and Microsoft Mahjong (Win 8), lead by far on W8. Despite not appearing in the started table, Puzzle by Nikoli X Sudoku (Win 8) pulls in plenty of completions in third, mostly because they can all be earned in the game's free trial. Many of the rest of the table reflects that of the WP table with a series of cross-platform titles, again many of which saw sales throughout the year. A few unique entries include Disney Fairies Hidden Treasures (Win 8), Glacier Blast and Adera (Win 8).

Top Windows 8 Games Completed

Achievements Won
249,176 TrueAchievements gamers won a total of 100,748,432 achievements online between them (90,943 different achievements).

Apart from one single Halo achievement, the whole list is shared almost equally between Titanfall and Destiny so no other titles get a look in.

Top Xbox One Achievements Won

The 360 gives us a bit more variety with six games represented. Five of these are "Games with Gold" titles as Dark Souls and Sleeping Dogs claim the top four spots along with Hitman, Saints Row and Civilization. South Park does manage to make a dent though, claiming seven spots.

Top Xbox 360 Retail Achievements Won

"Games with Gold" again dominates, with Deadlight pulling in seven places, including the top four. Dust, BattleBlock Theater, Motocross Madness, Charlie Murder and Toy Soldiers all grab the majority of places, leaving free-to-play titles Warface and World of Tanks to claim the remnants at fifth, ninth and eleventh.

Top Xbox 360 Arcade Achievements Won

Most of the WP table is shared between Temple Run and Wordament, with the former getting eight places and the latter getting six. Hexic, Angry Birds Rio and Mahjong all claim spots too but fail to really challenge the top two.

Top Windows Phone Achievements Won

Six different Microsoft titles flood the table apart from a handful of Wordament achievements in the bottom half and a single one for Hexic

Top Windows 8 Achievements Won

Last year Action-Adventure led by a significant margin. This year it leads again but the gap is a lot closer between it and Shooter. Titanfall, Destiny and Halo all helped close the gap but failed to tip the balance as simply more Action-Adventure games were played overall, especially through "Games with Gold". Role-Playing, Action and Sports again follow in third, fourth and fifth. This year Platformer steps up above Racing into sixth and Adventure maintains its eighth place position after rising from lower down last year thanks to the ongoing success of the Telltale titles.

Total TrueAchievements won by Genre
  • Action-Adventure633,344,822
  • Shooter600,922,498
  • Role-Playing219,583,434
  • Action206,013,273
  • Sports133,944,593
  • Platformer123,213,371
  • Racing100,762,780
  • Adventure54,185,525
  • Puzzle45,606,576
  • Simulation41,653,531
  • Strategy41,103,126
  • Card & Board23,694,647
  • Vehicular Combat18,295,705
  • Music & Rhythm17,156,452
  • Party11,321,619
  • Special6,459,833


That's all for now, folks. Hope you enjoyed glancing over these tables. Let us know how they compare to your 2014 and here's hoping your 2015 is a great one!
Chewie
Written by Chewie
Chewie is a Wookiee from Kashyyyk. Since helping the Rebel Alliance defeat the Emperor, he has taken up Achievement-Hunting and Newshoundery on TA. Also, ice-skating.
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